Apple v. Psystar, 2011: Reverse engineering and circumventing copy protection mechanisms is copyright infringement under the DMCA, 17 U.S. Code § 1201.
Apple v. Corellium, 2023: Fair use doctrine, even when validated, is not an excuse to dismiss claims of circumventing copyright protection mechanisms, and can not be used as a defense against such claims. No ruling can be made on the validity of DMCA counts using fair use doctrine as a defense. Note that this is the exact defense that Beeper claims will protect them against litigation.
Seriously, to any knowledgeable programmer who’s even vaguely familiar with copyright protection and the DMCA, this all screams as a legal dumpster fire just waiting to be set ablaze. It’s a fucking mystery how Beeper was able to get their engineers onboard with the whole thing in the first place, especially since Migicovsky, their co-founder and CEO, is a delusional, egotistical nutcase who doesn’t even understand how his own tech works.
You continue to assert that I haven’t provided factual information. I cite court cases and factual evidence about how the exploit works. Yet you continue to argue like an ostrich sticking its head in the sand, nitpicking on technicalities like “well the kid actually did it, not Beeper.” Yeah, because Apple’s lawyers would care about that.
Any time I attempted to discuss technical details, you pull out your “we’re laymen” and “we don’t know the details like you do, explain it for a layman” bullshit excuses to reduce things down to a strawman that you can then attack — I did this in genuine good faith, by the way, in the hopes that we can come to a mutual understanding!
I’m only responding now because you’re misrepresenting my arguments in bad faith to a third party. Otherwise, I’m not going to argue any further with someone whose stance is entirely and hopelessly sided against by existing case law and the entire body of copyright law, who doesn’t understand how the DMCA works, who doesn’t understand any basic tenets about how copyright fundamentally works, and even more egregiously, who refuses to take in new information that contradicts their worldview.
The complexities of this legal shit is why I fully stay away from reverse engineering proprietary protocols owned by trillion dollar companies, and don’t rely on the arguments of random clueless Redditors (or Redditor-likes, because that’s all Lemmy is nowadays) to bail me out of an inevitable massive lawsuit. You, as a self-admitted layman, seem to think otherwise. Dunning-Kruger and/or trolling in full effect. That’s why I blocked you.
(IANAL, TINLA, speak to your own lawyer, yada yada yada.)
Apple v. Psystar, 2011: Reverse engineering and circumventing copy protection mechanisms is copyright infringement under the DMCA, 17 U.S. Code § 1201.
Apple v. Corellium, 2023: Fair use doctrine, even when validated, is not an excuse to dismiss claims of circumventing copyright protection mechanisms, and can not be used as a defense against such claims. No ruling can be made on the validity of DMCA counts using fair use doctrine as a defense. Note that this is the exact defense that Beeper claims will protect them against litigation.
I have stated multiple times that Beeper is circumventing a copyright protection mechanism. I linked to the Python PoC, which is freely available for everyone to see. The exploit requires Mac serial numbers to forge an inauthentic Apple device identity, which need to be regenerated with a real, authentic Mac device. Additionally, the exploit needs to simulate an obfuscated macOS library, meaning the exploit itself hasn’t fully “reverse-engineered” the iMessage stack. Mac OS X has notoriously been impossible to simulate on non-Apple hardware, for issues of copyright infringement and license violations because of Apple v. Psystar. Beeper is simulating Mac OS X binary blobs on their servers (which is copyright infringement by Mac OS X’s licensing) for the intent of circumventing another copyright protection mechanism (which is copyright infringement by the DMCA), for the purposes of interoperability (which wouldn’t dismiss DMCA claims because of Apple v. Corellium.) And all of this is to bolster their “Beeper” brand, giving Apple’s lawyers a direct excuse for claims of monetary damages.
Seriously, to any knowledgeable programmer who’s even vaguely familiar with copyright protection and the DMCA, this all screams as a legal dumpster fire just waiting to be set ablaze. It’s a fucking mystery how Beeper was able to get their engineers onboard with the whole thing in the first place, especially since Migicovsky, their co-founder and CEO, is a delusional, egotistical nutcase who doesn’t even understand how his own tech works.
You continue to assert that I haven’t provided factual information. I cite court cases and factual evidence about how the exploit works. Yet you continue to argue like an ostrich sticking its head in the sand, nitpicking on technicalities like “well the kid actually did it, not Beeper.” Yeah, because Apple’s lawyers would care about that.
Any time I attempted to discuss technical details, you pull out your “we’re laymen” and “we don’t know the details like you do, explain it for a layman” bullshit excuses to reduce things down to a strawman that you can then attack — I did this in genuine good faith, by the way, in the hopes that we can come to a mutual understanding!
I’m only responding now because you’re misrepresenting my arguments in bad faith to a third party. Otherwise, I’m not going to argue any further with someone whose stance is entirely and hopelessly sided against by existing case law and the entire body of copyright law, who doesn’t understand how the DMCA works, who doesn’t understand any basic tenets about how copyright fundamentally works, and even more egregiously, who refuses to take in new information that contradicts their worldview.
The complexities of this legal shit is why I fully stay away from reverse engineering proprietary protocols owned by trillion dollar companies, and don’t rely on the arguments of random clueless Redditors (or Redditor-likes, because that’s all Lemmy is nowadays) to bail me out of an inevitable massive lawsuit. You, as a self-admitted layman, seem to think otherwise. Dunning-Kruger and/or trolling in full effect. That’s why I blocked you.
(IANAL, TINLA, speak to your own lawyer, yada yada yada.)